Monthly Archives: February 2017

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Shelter

I’m still reading on the book but so far Kat and Luka have my attention. Their banter, sexual innuendo make me, the reader, want to stay up until four or five in the morning to finish it.

So, for your pleasure and to tease you into wanting to read more of this book I have excerpts along with the book’s blurb to show you what a great read this book is for all lovers of romantic suspense.

From the Blurb:

Raw and risky, a new rural romance that explores the dark side of small towns, and the people who put everything on the line to protect them…

Kat Daily is excited to trade her Sydney airport quarantine uniform for an RSPCA inspector’s uniform and a job in the rural town of Walgarra. A fresh start in a new place, where she can make a real difference in the lives of the animals that she loves.

But Walgarra doesn’t offer a peaceful, bucolic existence. Like many small towns, the distance from urban settings — and urban law enforcement — has allowed a criminal element to set in. Kat may only be looking after animals, but that doesn’t mean she will be immune to people with sinister agendas.

The previous RSCPCA inspector was murdered, and Officer Luka Belovuk is determined to keep the new inspector from the same fate. He may have very broad shoulders, but carrying the safety of the law-abiding community just trying to live their lives has weighed him down, and one more death might be more than he can take.

Not all small towns are quaint and quiet, but they all have one thing in common: a community of people willing to protect their population with everything they have.

Excerpt 1

The young eucalyptus forest whispered ‘rural bliss’ rather than ‘murder scene’ but Kat knew better.

Will be your murder scene too, Galenka muttered.

Since Galenka, who sometimes preferred to be called Galina, was merely the vestigial remains of Kat’s childhood imaginary friend—a sad, mean half-Russian girl with snakes for eyes who relished her role as a troublemaker and prophetess of doom and who only made an appearance during times of great stress—Kat felt justified in ignoring her. Especially since Galenka spoke with an east European accent and haphazard sentence structure eerily similar to that of Kat’s late mother, whereas Kat’s English was perfect.

You can’t forget us, Galenka sneered.

Just watch me. I’m going to do my new job well and forget about everything else. You included.

Not happening.

Galenka, the little bitch, had appeared as soon as Kat had crossed the state border. Any psychologist would have a field day with that. Despite working at an international airport, Kat had never left Australia, had lived her whole life in and around Sydney. So now that she’d split up with New South Wales to take a job in Victoria, it only made sense that—like a cat dumped a long way from home—she was spooked by the wrong colour of the sky, the strange-smelling air and the wrong number of trees.

How she longed for her comfortable former rut right now.

The fierce afternoon sun baked the hard plastic steering wheel, the heat transferring to her engagement ring to turn it branding hot. Handling the steering wheel gingerly, she took the turn-off indicated on her GPS before pulling over to tug her fake engagement ring from her finger and slip it in her pocket. Petra, her quarantine colleague, had suggested the fake engagement ring. ‘Unless you want every two-headed, potato-humping breeder pawing at you, toots.’

Not a fan of country life, Petra.

Serenaded by shrieking cicadas she squinted at two pock-marked road signs through the heat haze rising off the bitumen. One sign, the one with a black blob with a tail on a yellow background, warned of crossing kangaroos, the other indicated that the Walgarra RSPCA shelter was thirteen kilometres away. Some friendly local had blasted holes through both signs so that each looked like a chewed leaf.

A nice, friendly touch. The urge to turn around and drive right back home made her fingers twitch.

Minutes later she passed the Welcome to Walgarra sign, bullets centred together in one large gaping hole, a mortal wound designed to spill guts.

Like last RSPCA inspector, Galenka leered.

Shut up.

A cluster of blood red, rusting farm letterboxes flashed by.

Don’t think about the murder.

But it was a lot like telling herself not to think of a blue cow. As soon as she did, all she saw were blue cows. Bullet-ridden blue cows. And no amount of self-administered pep talks changed the fact that violence was an occupational hazard that any RSPCA inspector could expect. Galenka’s comments had nothing on the news stories that a cursory Google search produced. Inspectors who’d been choked out, stabbed, punched and spat on. It was a sad fact that the people most likely to neglect or abuse animals were also likely to react inappropriately, and sometimes violently, towards inspectors investigating a case. And sure, that violence smeared queasy doubt all over the joy of working with animals, but those animals needed her. If she didn’t help them just because she was afraid then she was just as bad as all the people who never helped her, or her mother, because they were afraid to. Because her dad was not only a mean bastard but also a cop.

So stuff the queasiness, stuff the sweat that slicked her hands whenever she thought too long about the murdered RSPCA inspector. Faith in people—and she had no such faith—was not enough to protect the weak and vulnerable. Only laws and protective authority could work that magic and she’d signed up to do her bit.

She’d seen too many terrapins stuffed down travellers’ pants, too many rare birds tucked into socks. The parrots, pangolins and pythons stuffed inside suitcases, the drugs sewed into the bellies of puppies, she was sick of it, choking on it.

And all she had to do to change things, to feel clean again, was to hang onto courage and do her job.

You can do this.

Excerpt 2

Kat, squinting against the glare, clocked a figure poised on the threshold like an intruder.

Great, more trouble.

The man wore a face made for scars. And then there was that body of his—jacked in a way that would arouse envy in the weights yard of a maximum security prison.

And the manner in which he took in the whole room, absorbed it with one look? She knew. Though there was no police uniform, no weapons, no cuffs nor utility belt to confirm it, everything about him screamed law enforcement, from the shoulders built for breaking down doors to the flatly assessing stare harder than a riot baton. She knew what he was.

A cop.

Excerpt 3

Sweat drenched the neck of his grey t-shirt black and ran down his flushed face, but the gaze he turned upon the irate, cat-dumping dad was cold enough to freeze brand a steer. ‘Back it up, mate.’

The look on his clean-shaven, don’t-fuck-with-me face had the Father of the Year retreating several steps.

A white knight, one of the good guys, yet something about him left Kat feeling rattled rather than reassured.

Excerpt 4

Injury was not a worry, she knew from statistics that yoga or cycling could break bones or sprain limbs just as easily as a self-defence class. Still. She pictured herself wrestling a two-hundred-pound correctional officer or, worse, wrestling with this man. Her eyes went to the massive forearm resting on the car door and she couldn’t help picturing it hooked around her throat as Luka stood behind her applying a loving, therapeutic rear choke hold. A shockwave lurched through her, and it wasn’t fear. No, fear would have been too healthy, too normal for her.

See how great these excerpts are? Now, go grab a copy for yourself at any of the links below. I’m sure you’ll be wanting to stay up all night reading with me.

Author Info:

Living in Prague, Shanghai and Germany and studying several languages has given Rhyll a taste for the exotic, and she populates her writing with sexy Soviets, hot Aussie vixens and gratuitously attractive Teutonic gods. Outside of playing host to the United Nations of Hotness in her writer’s imagination, she can be found trying to pass for normal at her office job, twiddling with art, or reading. She’s also a proud member of Romance Writers of Australia.

Misty left us all hanging with her last book. What sex would Beatrice’s baby be?

In Fatal Courage, Beatrice is heading home from a mission she handled as head of Shadow Force. Her midwife induces her labor with a foot massge.

Misty invited her readers to vote for the baby’s sex. I refuse to give away the sex. You have to read the book. P.S. It’s not until the last page or two that you will learn what Cal and Bea had after all the excitement.

I think Misty has the perfect blend of romance and suspense. I have read several of her books, most of them in this series, plus she has another series that rocks.

If I hadn’t had her book on this blog I would have bought it anyway to see what the next adventure was for the men and women in the Shadow Force International Task Force.

I recommend this book to anyone who likes well developed, well liked, characters that have a range of emotions and traits. The book is well written, progresses along at a page turning pace. Grab your copy today at your favorite ebook retailer, Amazon US and UK, ibooks, and Kobo (links are below).

Misty is a great author. I’ve traded emails with her. She will answer readers questions. To me that makes a great author. If I can email you, the author, and ask something about the characters, her vision for the future books in the series, or anything and receive a reply. I’m happy. I’ve read several of Misty’s books besides the one’s I’ve reviewed on my blog. I think you will enjoy her Shadow Force Series.

BLURB:

***Girl or boy? Find out what Cal and Beatrice are having in this Shadow Force International Worlds novella! And meet Connor and Sabrina – two SFI members who must overcome their inner demons in order to find love in the middle of chaos.

Once upon a time, former Navy SEAL Callan Reese risked everything to protect his estranged wife from the enemies who wanted her dead. Now reunited and expecting their first child, Cal’s past makes Beatrice a target once again.

When Beatrice is kidnapped by a desperate woman bent on revenge, Cal must put everything on the line in the most dangerous mission of his life to keep her and their unborn child alive.

Full of pulse-pounding intrigue and a whole lot of heart, FATAL LOVE is a passionate thriller that’s sure to keep readers riveted from the first page to the last.

* * *

Excerpt from Fatal Love

FATAL LOVE, A Shadow Force International Worlds Novella

By Misty Evans

EXCERPT

Connor McKenzie woke to the phone blaring in his ear.

Probably because he was sleeping on top of it.

Drooling on it as well, because when he jerked back, his instincts automatically directed his hand to the handset, and he found slime all over the black SFI office phone.

Gross.

Of course, since he’d been working 24/7 with no time off, he hadn’t seen his bed since zero dark thirty-seven…no, make that eight, since the clock on the phone’s readout said it was after midnight.

Rubbing his eyes as the phone blared again, he pushed up off of his desk and cleared his throat. Near the desk, Maggie raised her big, black head and looked at him with her perpetually sad Labrador eyes.

Being the office manager for Rock Star Security came with a lot of perks. RSS was the front for Shadow Force International, where former SEALs roamed the hallways, covertly saving the free world on a daily basis. Connor was constantly surrounded by men he respected and who respected him. They understood each other; understood what each other had been through. Add to that the fact Beatrice let him bunk two floors up in an office he’d converted to a bedroom, and it was the best home he’d ever had. The bedroom wasn’t much, but it beat living out of his car.

Maggie was another perk. He loved that dog. Meeting his eyes, she wagged her tail with a solid thump-thump-thump against the floor.

She was always up for an adventure, and good to have around because of his PTSD. She didn’t have any training, but Cal had told Connor she’d saved his mental health many times. The dog had kept Connor from sinking into a dark hole on more than one occasion as well.

Technically since he lived upstairs, Connor could go home anytime he wanted, even though no one was in the office to man the phones but him. He and Rory had set up a system that transferred all calls to Connor’s phone in his bedroom when he quit for the day or needed down time. Beatrice didn’t trust an answering service with the particular calls that might come in from Rock Stars or SFI operatives.

Connor opened his tired eyes and caught sight of the blinking button on the phone as the damn thing continued to ring insistently. Red, not orange. The private line Emit had for the managers to use when they needed immediate assistance.

Shit. Grabbing one of the napkins from the pizza he’d half eaten earlier, he wiped off the drool from the handset and punched the button under the red, blinking light. “This is Slash. How may I direct your call?”

SFI rules were that they never identified the business when answering on the off chance it was a wrong number or one of them had been compromised. Beatrice was strict about that. While the cell phones every employee used were secure, breaches could happen. All personnel used code names and had to answer a security question before discussing any Rock Star or SFI business.

Just in case, Beatrice always said.

Connor had the feeling he didn’t want to know what just in case meant. He also didn’t want to know what might happen if he failed her.

“Con, we’re in trouble.”

Connor sat straight up, nearly knocking over his Coke. The voice on the other end was low and guarded, and the person had already broken protocol.

But it was a voice he knew well, and a person he definitely didn’t want to fail to help. If anything, he hoped to get on the guy’s SFI squad one of these days. “Sir? Please state your security clearance code.”

He stared at the handset. The queen bee was Beatrice. The hive was her and Cal’s home.

Beatrice was in imminent danger.

At home.

From whom? From what?

Fuck on a stick. Connor dropped the handset into its cradle, his guts turning over on themselves.

Emit, Rory, Jax, and Colton were all still in Chicago, opening the new Central Division Rock Star headquarters. Obviously, Cal, Beatrice, and Trace Hunter were back, but the rest of the Rock Stars and SFI operatives were working, many of them out of the country.

RS bodyguards couldn’t simply leave their clients. Ditto for the SFI operatives who were undercover on assignments at all four corners of the earth.

Connor started to lift the handset again and call Miles, but no, Miles was in San Diego, once more running the West Coast SFI office.

Which meant he was out of options.

Zeb. Yeah, he’d call the old spymaster…

His out-of-options list grew. Zeb had gone to Chicago with Beatrice. Connor hadn’t heard from him. Had he come back with Cal and the others or stayed in Chicago?

A burning sensation started in his gut while icy pinpricks attacked the base of his spine. Both spread like blood from a gunshot wound, making his body tremble and his breathing come in short, barely-there intakes.

Beatrice was in danger. Real danger if Cal was ignoring protocol and calling him for backup. Callan Reese was a former SEAL who’d saved the president in front of the entire world.

Beatrice’s personal bodyguard was Trace Hunter. Another former SEAL with superhuman powers. The guy belonged in a Marvel comic book for realz.

If both of them couldn’t handle whatever trouble Beatrice was in, well, then… How the hell was he supposed to?

His hand shook as he jammed his fingers through his hair. Get up, he told himself, but he couldn’t make his legs move. They were frozen stiff.

Not now! He couldn’t let his PTSD handcuff him.

Breathe. Beatrice was always telling him to take a deep breath and focus on one thing. A trick she’d learned from Hunter.

Grabbing the handset, he dialed Zeb, hoping against hope the old man was back in DC. Bracing the handset between his ear and shoulder, he woke up the computer and started shutdown procedures. He’d never had to do it before and another moment of indecision and self-doubt caught him with his fingers hovering over the keyboard.

He never left the office unless his backup, usually Rory or the new lab tech, Sabrina, was available to answer phones and handle emergencies.

Zeb’s phone rang three times. Voicemail answered. Connor left a quick SOS and asked Zeb to call him back.

What now? Should he gear up and head to Cal and Beatrice’s?

What about the baby?

If anything happened to any one of them…

Breathe…

Maggie whimpered, drawing his gaze. She sat beside the desk, tail rapping the floor and stuck her head in his lap.

There was no time to pet the dog, but his hand had a mind of its own, naturally going to Maggie’s head and rubbing her sleek, soft fur. His breathing resumed a semi-normal in-out rhythm after a moment and his mind re-engaged.

Grasping at straws, he dialed the lab extension, hoping against hope that Sabrina might somehow still be in the building. He’d never seen her leave—one of the reasons he routinely stayed at the desk so late every night was for that very reason. He enjoyed watching her sexy legs in those righteous high-heeled boots walk past his desk every evening. He loved her red hair and the way she teased him about being a camo-wearing receptionist, even though the term ‘receptionist’ made his ego smart.

From big, tough, badass SEAL to a useless receptionist. His life had gone to hell, thanks to 12 September.

Bastards.

Still petting Maggie with one hand, he closed off the black hole that sucked at him every time he thought of the terrorist group.

Bzzz-bzzz. The phone on Sabrina’s end rang again. It was Saturday night. A beautiful, smart, hip gal like her couldn’t possibly still be working this late on a Saturday night, could she?

“Conmeister?” Her voice was rough and sexy, like he’d woken her from a nap. He heard her yawn. “It’s nearly two a.m. What are you still doing at the main desk?”

God Almighty, he hated it when people called him nicknames, but hearing any version of his name coming from Sabrina’s luscious mouth was heaven. She got a free pass, regardless of what she wanted to call him.

“What are you still doing in the lab?”

She chuckled. “Touché. What’s up?”

“SOS from Cal. He and B got home from Chicago but something’s wrong. I don’t know what. He must have thought his cell was compromised because he was speaking in code, but he used my name, which is like, I don’t know what. I think he was definitely shook up.”

She was fully awake now. “Oh, shit. What can I do?”

“Man the phones and watch Maggie for me. I’m gearing up and heading their way.”

Her voice was full of indignation. “No way! Not without me. Who did you call for backup?”

“There is no one. Everyone is working or out of town.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Connor opened his bottom drawer and pulled out his Beretta PX4 Storm and checked the clip. Full. “With the addition of the San Diego and Chicago satellites, we’re short on staff. Literally, there’s just you and me in DC at this moment. We can’t leave the phones unmanned, so tag, you’re it.”

“Why don’t you call the cops?”

If Cal had thought the police could handle it, he would have dialed 911 himself. Whatever this was, he didn’t want them involved. “I’ve got to go.”

He hung up on her protest, punched the button to transfer incoming calls to the lab phone, told Maggie to stay, and headed for the weapons room.

Preparing for the enemy was challenging when you had no clue who the enemy was.

Pretend it’s a sleeper cell of 12 September. If you were taking them on, what would you bring?

A rocket launcher.

The biggest one he could carry, in fact.

SFI’s weapons room had plenty of firepower, but they did not, in fact, have any rocket launchers.

A shame, that. He mentally added it to his inventory list for next month.

Connor snatched a black duffel from a shelf and started throwing in grenades, a couple of H&K submachine guns, ammo, and a sweet sniper rifle he’d been dying to use.

He was strapping on a vest when Sabrina came skidding into the room in her socks. Her boots were in-hand, her hair flat on one side, totally sexy and tousled on the opposite.

Probably what she looked like when she first got up in the morning.

And damn, if her big brown eyes and that crazy hair didn’t make him hard.

“You’re not leaving without me, Conmeister.” She slipped on one boot—with a 3-inch black heel—jumping and hobbling on her other foot, and breathing heavy from her run to catch him. She was dressed from head to toe in red like always.

A deep burgundy red that totally clashed with her copper colored hair.

Connor tore his gaze away from her full lips and even fuller cleavage on display from the deep V of her silky shirt. She continued hopping on her foot as she pulled on the second high heel, the action jiggling her double-Ds and making his hard-on downright painful. “I’m totally leaving without you, Red.”

“Bullshit!” She snatched a bulletproof vest from the wall and shoved her arms through the holes. “You have no idea what you’re walking into. This is Beatrice we’re talking about!”

He slammed the cage shut on the submachine gun selection and locked it. “I’ll handle it, whatever it is.”

“Look,” she said, grabbing his arm. “I know I was just a chopper pilot and I never saw action like you did when I was in the Navy, but I know how to handle a gun. At least let me fly you to their house and set up a stakeout. I can have you there in fifteen. It will take you at least thirty by car.”

Fly? “Unless you have a magic carpet hiding under your lab coat, how are you going to fly me anywhere?”

Sabrina grinned, shrugging out of the lab coat and putting on the vest. “You know the helo pad on the U-Comm building at the end of the block? There’s an EC 145 that can cruise at 150 miles per hour easy. I happen to know the owner and we can use it, no questions asked.”

This woman in red was a mystery, but then, so were many of the people that worked for SFI. “You’re friends with the owner of one of the most expensive luxury helicopters available in the marketplace today?”

USA TODAY Bestselling Author Misty Evans has published over twenty novels and writes romantic suspense, urban fantasy, and paranormal romance. As a writing coach, she helps other authors bring their books – and their dreams of being published – to life.

The books in her Super Agent series have won a CataNetwork Reviewers’ Choice Award, CAPA nominations, the New England Reader’s Choice Bean Pot Award for Best Romantic Suspense in 2010 and the ACRA Heart of Excellence Reader’s Choice Award for Best Romantic Suspense in 2011.

Her Witches Anonymous series was dubbed a Fallen Angel Reviews Recommended Read. The Super Agent Series, Witches Anonymous Series, and the Kali Sweet Series have been on multiple Amazon Kindle bestsellers lists. Her culinary romantic mystery, THE SECRET INGREDIENT, and the first book in her Deadly series, DEADLY PURSUIT, are both USA TODAY bestsellers.

Misty likes her coffee black, her conspiracy stories juicy, and her wicked characters dressed in couture. When not reading or writing, she enjoys music, movies, and hanging out with her husband, twin sons, and two spoiled puppies.